Beauty and the Wolf

by Marina Myles

  “I’m sorry to tell you that your grandmother is dead. I, however, have become the matriarch of the tribe. I have directed my people back to this countryside in order to seek you out.”

  “So you can revoke the spell?”

  “No. Only the Gypsy who laid the curse in the first place can undo it.”

  Draven rose, a scowl contorting his face. “If my grandmother is dead, why did you come here? To torture me with your presence and to inform me that I will suffer as a werewolf forever—unless I am shot with a silver bullet?”

  Her sharp nose twitched. “You know you may will your own death.”

  Draven’s heart plunged. “I have already tried to kill myself. It didn’t work. My immortality prevailed.”

  “That is because Gypsies consider suicide a selfish act. It creates too much pain for those who are left behind. Thus, your mother’s death was not only tragic, but shameful. That fact enraged your grandmother even more.”

  “Gypsies are a complicated lot,” Draven said sourly.

  “Fortunately, willing your death is different than committing suicide to a Gypsy,” Marga said. “Someone must end your life out of an agreement you make with them. To me, you have proved that you have gained compassion and humility, but it is the forces of black magic that must be convinced.”

  “How do I do that?”

  “You must command someone to shoot you with a silver bullet. If the dark forces believe you have shown enough change, you will resume your human identity as a result. If you have not changed enough in the eyes of the underworld spirits, you will stay a beast forever—with no morphing back and forth into your human form.”

  Draven’s gut wrenched. “I cannot live as the beast any longer. This bloodlust is beginning to destroy me.”

  “Until you feel you have gained enough compassion, te na khut-shos perdal tsho ushalin. Try not to jump over your own shadow. The werewolf that lurks inside you makes you one entity.”

  “I beg of you!” Draven cried. “The evil this spell produces is overwhelming. It must be stopped!”

  “It is not up to me to stop it,” she said. “You have the purest, and the darkest, Gypsy blood running through your veins. The Szgamy tribe can trace its roots to the Carpathian Mountains in Romania—the very center of all black magic.”

  Draven looked crazed. “That heritage is poisoning everything about me. My sexual appetite . . . everything. I fear I will destroy my wife.”

  “Szgamys are undeniably passionate. And you, Draven, were a man who always loved with your body and never your heart.”

  “All that has changed. I love Isabella with every ounce of my being. And this blasted curse is standing in our way.”

  The woman’s tone quieted. “Are you forgetting about Isabella’s curse? Perhaps it is her spell that is standing in your way.”

  Draven’s eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”

  Marga shrugged. “You have chosen her and you love her. But the amulet made Isabella choose you. She is destined to destroy you, unless you can find the bracelet of Amenhotep. Because the Egyptians were the first practitioners of black magic, their spells are even greater than ours.”

  “I don’t believe it,” he said.

  The woman pulled herself to her feet. She placed a weathered hand on Draven’s arm. “I only came here to tell you about your mother and to let you know that I forgive you for my granddaughter’s death. Akana mukav tut le Devlesa. Now I leave you to God.”

  “God? How can you speak of God? He cannot help me now, but you can. You must revoke the curse.”

  She looked as if she were pondering something. Then she shook her head.

  “Wait.” He took hold of her bony shoulders. “You said I can die if I will the action. If I can convince someone besides Isabella to shoot me with a silver bullet then my wife will never have to bear the burden of ending my life.”

  The idea was a good one, but its outcome gripped Draven with sorrow since it meant being without Isabella.

  Marga’s expression grew grave. “A rauna spell is extremely powerful. It is a curse of penance. A person under its spell is transformed into an unfeeling, murderous creature on their twenty-seventh birthday. It is up to them to prove that they regret the disloyalty they’ve shown their people. If you are going to command your own death, Lord Winthrop, you can only do so during a full moon. It will honor your connection to the Gypsy culture and to the Dark Arts. It will also show that you know you have changed but that you are giving up your life selflessly regardless.” She paused. “The moment the silver bullet pierces your heart, you’ll know whether you will continue to live in your human form—or in your wolf form.”

  Draven sucked in a breath. He was willing to take the chance that he would be a beast forever if it meant sparing Isabella from killing him. “Tell me exactly what to do.”

  The Gypsy woman rolled her shoulders forward in an act of surrender. “You will not like it.”

  “Nothing can shock me now.”

  She looked up at him. Fear replaced the defiance in her black eyes. “After someone shoots you with a silver bullet, they must place you in a freshly dug grave that lies next to your mother’s resting place. This will make Miranda’s spirit happy for she will know that she is finally with you. Hopefully it will also end your identity as a werewolf forever. Do you think you can do this?”

  Draven paced back and forth by the roaring fire. He stopped in front of her. “Of course I can. Where is my mother buried?”

  “She rests by the pond where she drowned. Her grave is marked by a small, wooden cross. As it is too painful for me to go there, I can only hope the cross remains as a marker.”

  His eyes narrowed. “But how will I choose who will shoot me?”

  The woman reached up and took his hands in hers. It seemed imperative that she have his full attention before she spoke again. “The one who shoots you can be no ordinary person. They must be someone who loves you.”

  Horror swelled in Draven’s eyes. “But . . . but there is only one person who loves me and Isabella refuses to pull the trigger.”

  Marga wrapped a dark shawl over her cape for added warmth as she prepared to take her leave. “It is the only way to reverse a rauna spell.”

  “You don’t understand. She won’t do it!”

  “It is you who doesn’t understand, Draven. She will do it because it is her destiny. After she kills you, she will kill herself. I have seen the vision of her pulling the trigger of a gun.”

  “You have been no help at all. I wish you’d never come here,” he shouted as she moved toward the door.

  She didn’t react. “I will be staying at the Gypsy camp on the edge of town. Come to me and I will give you a special silver bullet that I shall pray over.”

  Before Draven knew it, the woman had slipped out of the room and left him inert in its center. His mind whirled. The woman hadn’t come to offer him forgiveness. She had come to torment him back to the brink of madness.

  There was no way out and the possibility churned his stomach like a foul disease.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Isabella had promised Draven that she would return before the next full moon—to tell him whether she would resume living with him or not. In the interim, she would learn if she was with child.

  Waiting those three, long weeks was agony for Draven. He passed the time as impatiently as a child forced to attend the symphony. And he had tortured himself with various scenarios.

  Should he tell Isabella everything? Or should he remain silent about what he had learned from the Gypsy woman?

  If only he could get his hands on that god-damned, Egyptian bracelet. But that was impossible. The bloody piece of jewelry was probably sitting in the vast Egyptian desert, buried beneath the shifting sands.

  Knowing that the next full moon was drawing near, Draven neither slept nor ate. Rather, he constantly thought of the knowledge Marga Yavidovich had given him. And that evilness wasn’t something he could dispel unle
ss he agreed to make the ultimate sacrifice. Isabella would be repulsed to know that the Gypsy woman believed it was she who would end his life before turning the gun on herself.

  No, Draven decided. Isabella must never know these things.

  It is up to me to find an alternate way out of my curse.

  Almost three weeks after Marga Yavidovich’s appearance, Rogers announced another visitor at Thorncliff Towers. Draven, annoyed that his morning sleep had been interrupted, responded to the valet in a groggy voice. “Whoever this unexpected visitor is, he or she must wait for me to dress. I shall receive them in the music room.”

  “The music room, sir?” Rogers asked.

  “That’s what I said, damn it!” Although he wouldn’t admit it, Draven didn’t wish to relive his encounter with Marga in the drawing room. He proceeded to pry himself out of bed and a quarter of an hour later, he greeted a kindly faced man sitting on the pianoforte bench.

  “I’m sorry to have you wait,” Draven mumbled as he covered the length of the room. “I am afraid I was awake all night.”

  “It’s quite all right.” The stranger spoke amiably, but irritation shone in his gray eyes.

  “You are . . . ?” Draven asked.

  “Benjamin Rayburn.” The gentleman stood and the two men exchanged handshakes.

  “Please be seated,” Draven offered.

  While Rayburn resumed his place on the bench, his tufted eyebrows and bushy mustache twitched. After he cleared his throat, he went on to explain that he was a friend of the Farrington family. He also claimed that he’d sent Harris Farrington correspondence ten days ago to arrange a visit.

  “I had hoped to see both Sir Harris and your wife.” Agitation surfaced in Rayburn’s tone.

  Draven strode to the picture window and threw back the curtains. He stared at the mist that rolled along the ground toward the gazebo. “I’m afraid that your timing leaves much to be desired, Mr. Rayburn. Lady Winthrop and her father are in London. She intended to seek medical help for Sir Harris.”

  “I don’t understand. Is Harris sick?”

  “Let’s just say that he has not been himself lately. Perhaps that is why he forgot about his appointment with you.”

  “I see.” Rayburn tugged on the points of his vest. “And when will Lady Winthrop be returning?”

  “Tomorrow,” Draven said, pivoting to face his visitor. “If you wish, you may stay the night as my guest.”

  “No, thank you. I must return to London.”

  “Shall I give my wife a message from you?”

  “Yes,” Rayburn replied. “The most important thing I wish to relay to Lady Winthrop is that her uncle, Morton Farrington, has never been condemned to Fleet’s debtors’ prison.”

  With that, Rayburn rose and handed Draven a business card. “Please have your wife contact me at her earliest convenience.”

  Claiming that he preferred to show himself out, Draven’s visitor disappeared from the room with a quick gait.

  Never been condemned to Fleet’s? Draven mulled the words over in his mind. Now his curiosity was completely aroused. And though he dreaded telling Isabella, he decided she must know the discrepancy in her father’s story.

  Relief rippled through Draven as Tuesday arrived. He picked at his nuncheon then stepped outside to meet his wife’s coach. Standing by the enormous front doors with his hands clasped behind his back, he realized that staying in that spot wouldn’t make her coach appear any earlier. He decided to pay a visit to his father’s gravesite.

  Encased by a low, wrought-iron fence, the family cemetery was located to the east of the house over a small knoll. Draven tugged his frockcoat lapels up against the sharp autumn breeze. He took the five-minute walk to the small graveyard under dreary, overcast weather that provided a perfect atmosphere for his visit.

  The yard contained only eight honorary plots because it was reserved for blue-blooded Winthrops—the first of which found their resting place here as early as 1596. Draven knew that if his illegitimate birthright were discovered, he would never be buried here.

  The familiar bitterness over his Gypsy heritage resurfaced. He stepped lightly among the headstones, and when he reached his father’s plot, he read the inscription he’d seen a thousand times before.

  HEREIN LIES CYRIL OCTAVIAN WINTHROP

  EARL OF DUNWICH

  1757–1807

  DEVOTED HUSBAND AND FATHER

  “ ‘Devoted,’ my foot,” Draven murmured under his breath.

  Helena would have placed any words on the headstone if those words portrayed her marriage in a good light. But he faced a problem graver than Helena’s insecurities. Could he prevent the woman he loved beyond all reason from being responsible for his death? If he succeeded in that, he would remain a wolf, forced to snatch away innocent lives while driving Isabella away in the process.

  Either resolution seemed heartbreakingly final.

  Draven raised his head at the sound of wheels crunching over gravel. Marching to the other side of the grounds, he watched the estate’s post chaise rock to a stop in the courtyard. Rogers clattered down from the bench and approached him with a troubled look.

  “Yer lordship, Lady Winthrop did not arrive on the carriage from London. Apparently she has decided to stay in London.”

  “God’s balls!” Draven began to rage.

  Rogers laughed, his eyes twinkling.

  He shook his head. “Not funny, you old coot.”

  The valet hastened back to the post chaise and opened the door. Draven drew in a breath as Isabella alighted. His wife’s pretty face appeared from beneath a fashionable, lavender bonnet. He had missed everything about her including the charming way her auburn hair framed her luminescent skin and how finely etched her small nose was. She was his whole world and his heart pounded.

  When their eyes connected for the first time in three weeks, he smiled. “My Bella.”

  Isabella cast her eyes downward.

  Draven’s nerves skittered. What is her decision?

  “How was your journey?” he asked as lightly as he could.

  She frowned. “Bumpy and uncomfortable, as always. But it’s no matter.”

  “Where is your father?”

  “He informed me that he won’t be returning here since my amulet has been found.” Isabella took his outstretched hand. “Our conversation was horrible.”

  He wanted to console her but he didn’t know how. “Shall we take a stroll?”

  She nodded stiffly. “I need some fresh air.”

  “What exactly did your father say?” he asked as she walked beside him, clutching her fur-trimmed muffler.

  “He denied taking the amulet. He suggested that you had it all along—so that you might return it and appear a hero. I rebuked your involvement and there was a tension between us one could cut with a knife.”

  Draven scowled. “Harris can create a million, strange explanations to cover up what he did, but I know what I saw, Isabella. I’m convinced he’s playing mind games with you, but I’m not sure why. Where is your amulet now?”

  “Safely concealed in the lining of my portmanteau.”

  “Excellent,” he said.

  Isabella’s eyes remained glued to the ground. “I arranged for him to stay with my cousin again.” She paused. “I’m just grateful to see you.”

  Draven’s insides flamed.

  They strolled as Isabella chattered on about her appointment with Dr. Van Sant. She told him that the doctor described amnesia as a very difficult condition to treat. Besides the fact that its victims don’t realize there are gaps in their memory, the ability to recall things needed to be restored on its own.

  The garden’s dry leaves snapped beneath their feet. Barren and brown, the desolate space seemed to want for a ray of sunshine—just like Isabella. Draven sat beside her on the stone bench amid an awkward silence.

  “No doubt your father hates me,” he said.

  “He doesn’t trust you.”

  He gave her hand a
squeeze. “Do you trust me?”

  “I’ve been doing nothing but thinking. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t bring myself to stay in London.” Torment swept over her face. “I grew incredibly hot, as if I had a fever, yet I didn’t. The doctors said it wasn’t illness, but it felt like a crippling disease. My bones ached. My mouth went dry. I lay in bed for days.”

  “Are you . . . with child?” Draven struggled to get the words out.

  “No.” Her face betrayed a host of emotions. “Pregnancy wasn’t making me sick, but I felt deathly ill. Strangely enough, I started to feel better as I prepared to return here,” Isabella said.

  It’s the power of the Egyptian amulet at work.

  She gazed at him with the innocence of a child. “I must tell you where I stand.”

  He held his breath.

  “People may think me mad, Draven, but I want to be with you.” Tears glazed her golden eyes. “Monster or not, I know another side of you. I know you are capable of gentleness—and love. And we shall fight this together.”

  Relief brought Draven’s shoulders crashing forward. He drew her to him. His soul sang with unbound happiness as he tried to push aside the fact that she was in danger being here. “I’ve missed you terribly. I could think of nothing but you.”

  Isabella sighed into the fabric of his coat. “You look as though you haven’t slept at all.”

  “I haven’t,” he admitted.

  “Is there something else you want to tell me?”

  Only the fact that I feel more doomed than ever because of my curse.

  “A gentleman by the name of Benjamin Rayburn arrived here at Thorncliff Towers yesterday.” He held her at arm’s length so he could see her face. “The man was cordial, but he seemed put off that your father wasn’t here. He claimed that your father was expecting him.”

  “That’s very odd.” Isabella’s face twisted up. “My father never said anything about expecting a visitor. Why didn’t Uncle Ben stay until we returned?”

  “I’m not sure. But he handed me his calling card. I’m to give it to you, not your father.”

  She took the card from Draven. “I shall contact him immediately. Did he say anything else?”